Thursday, March 20, 2008

Maundy Thursday


Today is Maundy Thursday. For those of you who do not know what it is, here is a definition from Wikipedia.

"In the Christian liturgical calendarMaundy Thursday or Holy Thursday is the feast or holy day falling on the Thursday beforeEaster that commemorates the Last Supper of Jesus Christ with the Apostles. It is the fifth day of Holy Week, and is preceded byHoly Wednesday and followed by Good Friday.

On this day four events are commemorated: the washing of the Disciples' feet by Jesus Christ, the institution of the Mystery of theHoly Eucharist at the Last Supper, the agony of Christ in the Garden of Gethsemane, the betrayal of Christ by Judas Iscariot.

The morning celebration of these events marks the beginning of what is called the Easter Triduum or Sacred Triduum. The Latin word triduum means a three-day period, and the triduum in question is that of the three days from the death to the resurrection of Jesus. It should be noted that for Jesus and his followers a day ended, and a new day began, at sunset, not at midnight, as it still does today in the modern Jewish calendar.[1] The Last Supper was held at what present-day Western civilization considers to be the evening of Holy Thursday but what was then considered to be the first hours of Friday. Its annual commemoration thus begins the three-day period or triduum of Good Friday, Holy Saturday and Easter Sunday, days of special devotion that celebrate as a single action the death and resurrection of Christ, the central events of Christianity."

John Piper wrote a good article giving us thoughts about today. You can read it here.

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